NICOSIA (AFP) - Flash protests in small groups, pictures projected onto the walls of apartment blocks, fountains whose waters are dyed red: Iranian youth, with whatever means they have at their disposal, have adopted various tactics to keep the flames of the demonstrations protesting the death of Mahsa Amini alive.

The protest movement has proven resilient for more than a month since its eruption, despite a crackdown by security forces that has claimed the lives of at least 122 people.

The protests erupted in response to the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was arrested by Tehran's morality police on the grounds of not adhering to the Islamic Republic's strict dress code.

Women led the movement and even took off their headscarves, set them on fire and marched chanting "Women, Life, Freedom" and "Death to the Dictator", movements and slogans that were repeated around the world.

Despite the restrictions on the internet and the blocking of access to popular applications such as Instagram and WhatsApp, the young people still managed to produce videos depicting their protests.

Video footage, in what looks like a game of chase, showed drivers honking their horns in support of the demonstrators and blocking roads with cars to slow the security forces down.

Street traffic was also obstructed by tipping over and setting rubbish bins on fire, and in some cases overturned police cars.

Security forces responded by riding motorcycles to pass and were seen removing license plates to later identify and arrest the drivers.

Police on motorbikes have also been seen firing shotguns, tear gas or even paintballs at protesters to track them down.

- 'Great courage' -

The youths, in turn, resorted to masking, switching their phones to "airplane mode" to avoid being located, and carrying extra clothes to replace the paint-stained ones.

In a video clip circulating on social media, protesters are seen removing a surveillance camera over a road in the city of Sanandaj in Kurdistan Province, Mahsa Amini's hometown.

Others are seen in other footage organizing more small, snappy rallies away from the city squares that are usually used for political rallies.

“It takes a lot of courage to take to the streets when the security forces know everyone,” Shadi Sadr, the London-based director of the Justice for Iran Association, wrote on Twitter. “The uprising continues but we are seeing fewer videos due to the strict restrictions on the internet.”

Pictures of women cutting their hair during the protests spread as an expression of grief that has turned into a symbol of resistance drawn from Persian folklore.

Those who were afraid to take to the streets resorted to other, more discreet ways of participating. Two weeks ago, a form of protest emerged, in which the waters of fountains in Tehran turned blood-red after being dyed red by artists to reflect the deadly oppression.

In a similar vein, art students at a university in Tehran filmed a video showing their hands raised in the air and covered in red paint. On the same day, activists from the Adalah Ali group hacked a live news broadcast of state television and superimposed an image of a target and flames over the image of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Pictures circulating on the Internet this week showed an effigy of a cleric hanging from a bridge in Tehran.
In a video taken at night, Amini's face was projected onto the wall of a residential tower in Tehran's Ekbatan neighborhood, as protesters chanted from windows or rooftops.

- Unstable balance -

Schoolgirls even moved with their backs to the camera and removed their headscarves before raising their middle fingers at pictures of Khamenei in the classroom.

Independent researcher Mark Peroz said his analysis of visual evidence on social media showed that the peak of the protests was on September 21 and that participation decreased during the current month.

But he told AFP that while the protests "have peaks and troughs, there is still a level of sustainability that we did not see in previous periods of protest" such as the 2019 demonstrations that erupted due to a sudden rise in fuel prices.

Henri Rommy, an Iran specialist at The Washington Institute, said he expected the protests to continue for some time. "The better their ability to organize and coordinate, the greater the chance of expanding their support base and posing a clear challenge to the regime in the short term," he told AFP.

"But the state security apparatus excels precisely at disrupting this kind of organized dissent, thanks to an elaborate toolkit of violence, arrests, internet disruption, and intimidation," he added. Hence, "at the moment, the state and the protesters are in a state of precarious equilibrium, with which it cannot Neither of them was able to overcome the challenge posed by the other, which indicates that the protest movement and the current violence may continue for a long time.